Here is the place where I love you
by tetanahayna
Summary: One-shot of Rue's death from her own point of view. Disclaimer: All rights to Suzanne Collins


The adrenalin is pounding in my ears as I try to nestle myself out of the rough ropes that make up the net. But the more I struggle, the more I find myself knotted tighter and tighter; trapped like an animal, to wait for her doom.

I scream her name, frantically, repeatedly, at the top of my lungs, until the lack of air hinders me from doing so, and I'm left coughing and struggling to breathe. I force my eyes shut tightly – my frenzied cries for help were loud enough for the entire forest to hear, meaning that anyone of _them_ can show up too. I feel my lip begin to tremble with fear, and I pray silently to myself that they wont play with their food, and finish me quickly.

I pray that my parents wont have to suffer, but deep inside me, I know that they will. I know that this very part, the pain and suffering, is what is recorded and replayed. I know that my family, my previously warm and jubilant family, will have to relive this moment numerous times.

And that's when I hear her. Her voice, filled with fear and panic, calling my name just as frantically as I had been calling hers. I feel her resolute hands grab hold of my capturer, the felonious web in which I was entangled like a fly, and with a quick cut of her dagger, she'd let me free. The feeling of relief wells over me, and I'm suddenly so overwhelmed that I can feel my throat lump up and my eyes cloud with tears. I've been saved.

I can see the relief relax her face too – her brows cease to furrow, the concentrated crease in her forehead smoothens out, her hurried hands grasping on to my arms as if checking if I'm still here, if it's still me, and most importantly, if I'm still alive. She pulls me up on to my feet, and we ready to go. And that's when I see him.

Right above her shoulder, about three metres away. His features so magnificently vicious – too perfect, precisely like his partner before she'd been mutilated with venom. His lips curl in to a mischievous grin, and that's when I know. Only one of us can survive him, and his target most certainly isn't me.

She must've noticed me freeze up in fear, notice my eyes widen, and notice my glance, fixated at the point right above her shoulder.

He simply stands there, calm. This is a game to him. He begins to raise his spear, taking aim.

Her gaze still bores in to me as realisation hits her – we aren't alone. She grabs hold of her arrow and wheels around, readying herself to shoot.

It all happens in one second, but the one second feels like it drags on teasingly, but still fast enough to hinder anyone from preventing what is about to happen.

_**Deep in the meadow, hidden far away**_

I see his eyes widen in shock when her arrow pierces his neck, and the blood begins to flow like a waterfall and stain his fair skin a fluorescent crimson. His spear brushed past her ears and thankfully missed. She turns around to check on me, to reassure me that everything is okay now, but instead the blood leaves her face and she becomes almost ghostly.

_**A cloak of leaves, a moonbeam ray**_

It happened so fast that the pain only hit me seconds after. I begin to say something, but my stomach twists and all I can do is let out an agonised yelp. I look down to see the deadly sharp metal has speared me through my middle, and my shirt is quickly beginning to stain with the same fluorescent crimson that discoloured him. I begin to fall on my numbed legs, but her hands catch me and rest my head on her knee. I can see that she's trying to think of a way to solve this, make it okay. But it's not okay, it was never okay, this was always going to happen.

_**Forget your woes and let your troubles lay**_

The pain travels through my body so fast, that my screams stick in my throat. It is gnawing, stabbing, stinging at my every muscle and bone. I can feel my pulse quicken in my middle, right around the metal pole that has pierced right through me. Please, I try to say, please save me. I don't want to die. Please. But of course, they don't come. They were never going to come. My limbs start to ache, and fade, and soon I am unable to feel anything but the ache in my heart.

_**And when again it's morning, they'll wash all away**_

The same lump in my throat starts to twinge, and this time I can't resist the tears. I don't want to die, I want to scream, how can you let me die like this, how can you let anyone die like this? She looks down at me, stroking my face, and trying to dry my tears. And for a moment, just a brief moment, her face is replaced with the familiar face of my mother. My mama. Her sad eyes are glistening with the same tears that well down from me, as she strokes my forehead. She tells me that everything is going to be all right, and that it's not going to hurt anymore. But we both know that it is. That the very thought of never meeting again is what hurts the most.

_**Here it's safe, and here it's warm**_

And just like that she's gone. Another scream is caught in my throat – I want her to come back, to hold me, to comfort me, to be with me. Instead I look up at the face of she who has tried to save me at the cost of her own life. She has to win, I tell her. She has to at least try, because she's better than all of them. I ask her to sing a song, and I can tell that the anguish of what is about to happen is clogging her throat too. But she tries.

_**Here the daisies guard you from every harm**_

Her anguished song fills the meadow. But it isn't enough to soothe the excruciating ache in my heart. I think of their faces, my younger siblings who tried to stop me from going, seriously suggesting that we hide me, not knowing that it wouldn't work. I think of my father, whose hugs I'm never going to feel again, and whose melodic whistle I'm never again going to fall asleep to. I think again of my mother, who is never again going to stroke my hair as I fall asleep, or ice my fore head as I lay sick with a fever. I don't want to die, I want to say. I want to go _home_.

_**Here your dreams are sweet and tomorrow brings them true**_

Everything has started to fade around the edges now. My breath has started to slow, and I can tell that she has noticed, because she's clenched me tighter. I look up at her again, and with the last bits of energy that I can muster, I tell her again – She has to win. A brilliant and blinding light, and then everything fades in to darkness.

_**Here is the place where I love you**_

A cannon.


End file.
